NBC just posted the NBC Meet the Press Interview with DJT.
There are two versions posted, the cut-up edited one, and full one which is about 15 minutes longer. Cudos to NBC for posting both (though perhaps it was a Trump condition? ‘Dunno). The full interview is below, and is the only one worth watching.
The edited version isn’t exactly misleading, but it omits a lot of Trump’s more fulsome answers giving justifications rather than just sound bytes. It also omits a few hilarious bits at the expense of the mainstream media and the interviewer. There’s a hilarious bit where he scolds the interviewer on her obvious bias and relates it to the deepening distrust for the mainstream media.
But, all in all, the interview is very policy-oriented, unlike anything we’ve seen during the election from the mainstream media (more’s the shame).
However, the interviewer’s tone and manner is almost continuously insulting, and every question is framed as a ‘gotcha!’, but President Trump doesn’t fall for any of them. Ha ha.
At one point she tries to get him to admit that 2020 was not rigged. He maintains it was, but quickly moves off the topic coming back to price of groceries and illegal immigration as his focus.
Interestingly, on that point, I just came across the following chart posted.
It shows all the counties historically known as presidential “bell weather” counties: those that if the candidate wins those counties, it’s highly predictive of them winning the election.
In most years there’s 0, 1, or maybe 2 counties out of the 17 that buck the trend. In 2020, ALL BUT ONE went against the trend, which is just so sus. I know it’s not evidence, just circumstantial, but come on people.
At any rate, the full interview above is definitely worth a listen, particularly if you’re a Trump hater.
Would be very interested in your reactions to anything he says. Let’s try to keep it really based on what he says here, rather than anything you imagine he said elsewhere. Post a timestamp in your comment and tell me where you strongly agree or disagree with Trump and why.
Ugh,can’t this place be an escape and safe haven from politics and all the other nonsense going on in the real world?
ReplyDeleteI think the blog title is clear enough. Just don’t read the political ones.
DeleteI'm sure you'll be blown away, but I don't disagree with you that it was a good, policy-oriented interview. I disagree that Welker's tone was insulting. She was pilloried (rightly) for letting Trump walk all over her in her first interview, which was her first upon taking over as host of Meet the Press. Clearly stung by the criticism, she has gotten much better at asking follow-up questions with ALL her guests, and her tone is about the same regardless of who she is interviewing. I still find her kind of irritating regardless of who she interviewing. Women hate the term, but her voice is objectively "shrill." Margaret Brennan on Face the Nation is by far the best-prepared and most policy-oriented interviewer on any of the networks these days. It will also come as a surprise that I kind of like Shannon Bream on Fox, though she does tend to toss the MAGA guests a lot of softballs. But, like Brennan, she is usually very well prepared and asks substantive follow-ups.
ReplyDeleteOn immigration, Trump was much more straightforward than most of his surrogates and supporters, you included. After the election, virtually every one of his surrogates who appeared on national news programs dodged how he is going to deport 12M people. Instead, they kept trying to pivot to discussing the "first step" of deporting felony-level criminals. None of them would discuss, at all, what anything beyond that first step would entail, and many of them consistently refused to even confirm that there was any plan to go beyond deporting criminals. You yourself responded to a commenter who left a typically far-right screed applauding plans to deport them all with something to the effect of "we should deport the criminals and then assess." That obviously was not what Trump campaigned on, and in the interview he stuck to his position that all 12 million must go. He has no prayer of actually doing it, and his economic analysis of their effect on the economy made no sense at all, but at least he stuck to his campaign positions, unlike so many of his supporters and surrogates. If he does somehow manage to do it, I hope I'll stop hearing whining about the cost of groceries and housing, since all the foreign laborers who pick those crops and milk those cows and hang out on the roofs of houses in 120 degree temps in Phoenix will be gone, leading to massive increases in low-skill wages and higher prices across the board.
I agree he gave mostly straightforward answers. The big exception was around retaliating against political enemies. He said he has no plans to "look back" but also insinuated that once partisans like Bondi and Patel are confirmed, he'll have no control over anything they might do, which is obviously nonsense. They are probably his two most sychophantic appointments to date, and the idea that they won't take direction from the White House is laughable.
He also wasn't very forthcoming on plans for the Affordable Care Act. He went on his usual long-winded attack on John McCain, while dodging putting any meat on the bone regarding his "concept of a plan" for modifying it. He did seem to concede it won't be killed and that any replacement would cover pre-existing conditions, but he got a little squirrely about cost of coverage for those with such conditions. It's an issue, because the few details JD Vance has given about his thoughts on medical coverage reform, once you remove the fluff and really listen to what he is proposing, is basically a return to pre-ACA days, where people with pre-existing conditions pay more. He always phrases is it as "those in perfect health will pay less," but that's obviously just the flip-side of insurers can charge those with pre-existing conditions more. (Though, one wonders how this is going to play out following the killing of the UnitedHealth CEO. I've honestly been pretty shocked at all the internet memes applauding the killing, with many of them suggesting it should happen to more CEOs. There's clearly *a lot* of anger out there at insurance companies and particularly around coverage denials.)
She tried to trap him multiple times into saying he’ll direct the DOJ to persecute his political enemies. She must have asked it a dozen times. And then she’s effectively denying the destruction of the J6 Committee evidence, which is public record, and what got her scolded by Daddy.
DeleteI don’t know what answer to those questions could have convinced you. He didn’t do any of that in 2016, and the DOJ was weaponized against him.
The ACA was not a presidential issue this time around. It was nowhere in his platform and he never spoke of it. He was screwed last time by Congress. I think this time he thinks it’s Congress’ issue to deal with.
She asked him the question about prosecuting political enemies several times, because he kept dancing around it. I love the way you supporters all keep baldly asserting he didn't do any of that in 2016. But, he did in fact try to sick both DOJ and the IRS on political enemies. They just wouldn't do it. Further, Kash Patel is on record saying they WILL go after people on his enemies list, including members of the press. So, asking Trump for a straight answer on it was totally within reasonable bounds.
DeleteI thought he was very clear each and every time. If there is any law breaking identified, his expectation is that they will pursue it, but he won’t be specifically directing it.
DeleteKash is on record as saying he’ll prosecute lawbreakers. Please point me to any quote other than that.
Trump “tried” - really? How hard? Well, Obama and Biden tried and succeeded.
Somehow it's never a possibility that efforts to go after Trump were more successful because Trump just did way more shady shit. I honestly don't know why conservatives spend so much time whining about the DOJ. They prosecuted Hunter. Twice. They've prosecuting Bob Menendez. Those prosecutions moved expeditiously (by government standards). In the meantime, Merrick Garland slow rolled both the pre-charging investigation of Trump and the prosecutions, virtually guaranteeing that the cases wouldn't end before the election. Folks on your side should be throwing a parade for Garland.
DeleteAs I argued above, the Hunter prosecutions were a smokescreen. Wasn’t Menendez the one caught with big bars of gold? I think he went against the powers that be so they exposed what they knew all along to oust him from power. Not a good example.
DeleteI’m happy to debate the merits of any and all the Trump cases. They are all lawfare.
The reason they were “slow rolled” was because none had any chance on appeal, and so they timed it to maximally impact his campaign.
[Part 2]
ReplyDeleteHe confirmed that he will not try to take the US out of NATO but said the other members will need to pay their share. That's a reasonable position and always has been. The NATO members who are on the frontline with Russia and understand the threat (Poland, Estonia, etc.) generally pay *more* than we do as a proportion of their GDP, but several others are freeloaders; one of the worst examples being . . . Canada.
He also seemed to confirm that he plans to pardon J6 rioters on day one but didn't give details about whether that will include those who assaulted police officers or those who were convicted on insurrection-related charges, like the leaders of the Proud Boys and Three Percenters. Welker should have asked follow-ups but whiffed. He didn't say much about Biden's use of the pardon power vis-a-vis Hunter, plainly because he plans to make vigorous use of it himself.
So, as I said, I thought it was a pretty straightforward, policy-oriented exchange. She asked straightforward questions and, for the most part, he gave straightforward answers that were generally consistent with his campaign positions.
If you listen carefully to his answer on J6 pardons he said he will START on day 1, and would deal with them case by case. Most thinking conservatives think all the non-violent ones should be pardoned outright and immediately, and the violent ones should have their sentences looked at and possibly commuted in-line with what violent BLM protesters received.
DeleteSorry, but that moral equivalency argument is nonsense. The Proud Boy and 3%-er defendants were very clearly trying to overturn an election, as were many of the individual defendants. They bragged on social media that it was their goal. There is a BIG difference between trying to overturn an election and BLM rioters. They are not remotely close in terms of threat to the republic and democratic norms involved. Nice try. If you try to overturn a democratically elected government by force, you should rot in jail for a very, very long time.
DeleteThe motivation of all the J6ers was to right a perceived wrong. If you stand by and accept something you believe to be a rigged election, you are no patriot.
DeleteSame as some of the BLM rioters, rioting to right a perceived wrong (although most seemed to be just rioting for riot’s and looting’s sake).
You aren't a patriot if your definition of "rigged" was that your side lost. What happened to all that massive voter fraud? Most of the state laws didn't change, since you all lost all the cases you brought challenging election procedures. When you lost under those laws it was all rigged, and when you won it was suddenly a "perfect" election.
DeleteYour last sentence drips with irony, given how many of the J6ers' have defended their actions by claiming they started out just peacefully protesting but ended up getting swept up in the emotions of the crowd. Somehow, it's a legit defense when the motive of the crowd was attacking the Capital but illegitimate when the crowd was protesting a horrific death that was just the latest in a series of horrific deaths.
That is not the definition of rigged. The definition of rigged is a massive shift to mass mail in voting against state laws with lax or nonexistent signature checks making fraud virtually undectable. It’s massive 3am dumps of “found” ballots breaking 99% for Biden. It’s all the bell-weathers going against any historic norms. It’s the most unpopular candidate in modern history somehow getting more votes than Obama. It’s 95% negative coverage in the press. It’s censorship of conservative voices. It’s supression of the Hunter laptop story. I could go on…
DeleteEven if you think none of that matters, a very high percentage of conservatives and even many in the left believe it to be true. You live in some fantasy world where all the people who believe it was rigged, really, secretly, know it wasn’t but want to “Steal your Democracy”. Paranoid much?
The motive of the crowd was protesting a rigged election, obviously. Why you can’t you admit that?
With regard to mass deportations, the Administeation only has so many resources so I think they'll go after the worst elements first and then see who decides to self-deport. This talking point of "who will pick the crops" sounds an awful lot like the plantation owners before the Civil War.
ReplyDeleteI think this interview was somewhat of an olive branch to the reasonable portion of the left, as he said several things in it that the right-wing hardliners would find a bit disappointing like his ACA and DACA comments. But on the balance it was a reiteration of his main campaign points of securing the border, curbing the bureaucracy's power, cutting government waste, and trying to settle things down abroad.
But to close on a nonpolitical note and bringing the conversation back to sore bottoms, I wouldn't might giving Miss Welker a spanking. She looks like she has a shapely tush.
If picking the crops is the problem, they can deal with that legally through temporary work visas (as they do, no?)
DeleteAnd yes to a spanking for Ms. Welker!
How about every time you do a political post you publish a picture of your spanked bottom as penance?
ReplyDeleteI’ll consider it! 🍑
DeleteWhere Im from in Australia you can debate who and how many you let in - but for fucks sake control your borders. Not controversial.
ReplyDeleteWhat about Canada though? I hear they have millions overstaying their visa every year and no plan to do much about it? What are you ice Mexicans up to?
Our PM is a horrible puppet globalist, but we’ll be rid of him next year.
DeleteOh yeah then there’s the apple eating bloke tormenting the woke journo. Saw that interview. Pierre Poilevre. Funny. He might give Trumpy a bit of what for. Not the 51st state just yet then Ms J?
DeleteThat’s the guy. Trump is trolling Turdeau and we love it up here!
DeleteYeah Trudeau looks weak as piss. Gotta go surely. But careful what you wish for. Trumps a loose cannon as an ally. He’s not your friend. America first remember.
DeleteWe have too many god damn indians here in canada and poilievre is not going to do a damn things about it imho. Need to elect someone who will.
DeleteI never think in those terms. To me, people are just people. You could probably rephrase that into some critique of immigration?
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